The police commissioner hired a mathematician to help at a crime scene. At the scene were between 100 and 200 glasses of wine. Exactly one glass was poisoned. The police lab could test any sampling for poison. A group of glasses could be tested simultaneously by mixing a sample from each glass. The police commissioner desired only to minimize the maximum possible tests required to determine which exact glass was poisoned.

The mathematician started by asking a detective to select a single glass at random for testing. "Wouldn't that waste a test?", the detective asked. "No, besides I'm in a gambling mood.", the mathematician replied. How many glasses were there?

(In reply to re(3): Waste a test by SilverKnight)

I do not want to argue. However, in my opinion when you have a method A which can distinguish a poisoned glass in 7 tests in 98,45% of cases and in 8 tests in rest 1,55% of cases and you have a method B, which will do the same in 8 tests 99,2% of time, I wouldn't call choosing method B as "minimizing the maximum possible". Perhaps I just have a different perception of words not being a native English speaker.

Posted by Saso on 2003-11-07 03:37:59